Did you launch a new website last year? If so, you're not alone. According to Web monitoring service Pingdom, there were a total of 555 million websites online, as of December 2011. Of those, 300 million were created in the last year alone.

That's not the only staggering statistic available in Pingdom's thorough report. Here are a few others to chew on:

--There are currently about 2.1 billion Internet users in the world, compared to the world's total population of about 6.99 billion. Of those online, 922.2 million come from Asia, 485 million of which come from China alone. The US and Canada combined account for only 271.1 million Web surfers.--Of the 2.1 billion Internet users, 45 percent are under the age of 25.--North America currently has the highest number of citizens online, with a 73.3 percent penetration rate. Europe is only at about 58.3 percent. Asia has 11 percent Internet penetration. And Africa has a mere 11 percent of its people online.--As we all know by now, Facebook has more than 800 million users. The social network added 200 million in 2011.--There are currently 225 million Twitter accounts, but only 100 million active Twitter users.--With 39 percent market share, Internet Explorer remains the most popular browser in the world. Chrome is now second, with 28 percent. And Firefox is a close third, at 25 percent. Safari only accounts for 6 percent of the browser market.

This is only a fraction of the impressive stats Pingdom has gathered. Definitely head over and give it a read; it will put this whole Internet thing into perspective.

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